Environmental Services

Grasslands are likely to provide many environmental services, although these environmental functions will depend on the type of grassland (permanent or temporary), geographic location and their location on the scale of a landscape, cultural practices and farming methods (Huyghe, 2009).

There are four types of environmental services:

• Limiting erosion and soil losses
• Limiting losses of fertilizing elements, specially nitrogen leaching
• Reducing energy consumption and emissions of greenhouse gases
• Preserving biodiversity